I found a reason

My husband is a runner. I don't want to be. I don't really like it. But he read this book once and it talked about this race where they invited these indigenous Mexican? or South American? people to run this 100 mile race or something. And these amazing runners were getting schooled by these people. And the people would pass them and be laughing and joking like they hadn't been running 100 miles. They ran because they loved it.

And if I run, it HAS to be for the fun of it--otherwise I don't want to do it.

So I've found a reason to run.

The Color Run
January 2013

It's what's underneath

I am voting for MITT.

I hesitate a bit at saying that because politics is so heated and I don't like to debate. I love to say my opinion, but if you give me a face to face debate, I will lose. I am not a quick thinker. I do find myself witty and clever, but I turn more to sarcasm than I do facts and figures. And usually people who want to debate, want to debate to hear themselves talk--not to actually listen to what I have to say. So I can put it on my blog--and you can add your opinion to my comments, absolutely. But I don't have to debate. Because mostly by the end if you are debating me--I just end up thinking you are an a-hole.

I don't like politicians.

I don't like Politics. I don't like politicians. I don't like what it does to people. And really--when they debate are any of them actually saying what you think they really want to say? NO. They are saying general statements and trying to balance positions so they can get elected. And that will never change. It's ugly.

Mitt is a politician.

Don't think I'm going to say he's not one. He is. They all are. I also like Ron Paul--but he is also a politician. I think he has the best ideas, but I don't think the American public would ever go for that--because the majority are . . . well .. . idiots. And they would prefer America borrow until we go belly up so that no one gets their feelings hurt.

It's not because he's Mormon.

I'm not voting for him because he's Mormon. Although I have to say it has some influence on me. Why? Because I know that being Mormon, he believes that America is a choice nation--divinely destined to be so (it's in the Book of Mormon). That as long as it's people turn to God it will be protected. I also know that every morning and every night that man will get on his knees and pray that he may be guided to make the right decisions. That matters. He may not make the right decisions, but at least he's pleading for help from God--the only being who could actually do something.

It IS because he's a business man

I don't want someone who studied political science. I don't want someone who has book knowledge and not practical knowledge. I want a businessman. I want someone who is going to turn our business around. America is a business--face it. Someone who will assemble a team of "executives" who can look at our books, cut what needs to be cut, fix what needs to be fixed, and focus on what is going well--and make it better. It won't be pretty. I want someone will face the ugly--and force some change.

So behind the ugly politician, behind the Mormon, behind the bruhaahaa is a man--a man who did this:



In July 1996, the 14-year-old daughter of Robert Gay, a partner at Bain Capital, had disappeared. She had attended a party in New York City and gotten high on ecstasy. Three days later, her distraught father had no idea where she was.

Romney and the other parnters closed down the entire firm and asked all 30 partners and employees to fly to New York to help find Gay's daughter. Romney set up a command center at the LaGuardia Marriott and hired a private detective firm to assist with the search. He established a toll-free number for tips, coordinating the effort with the NYPD, and went through his Rolodex and called everyone Bain did business with in New York, and asked them to help find his friend’s missing daughter. Romney's accountants at Price Waterhouse Coopers put up posters on street poles, while cashiers at a pharmacy owned by Bain put fliers in the bag of every shopper. Romney and the other Bain employees scoured every part of New York and talked with everyone they could .... prostitutes, drug addicts – anyone.

That day, their hunt made the evening news, which featured photos of the girl and the Bain employees searching for her. As a result, a teenage boy phoned in, asked if there was a reward, and then hung up abruptly. The NYPD traced the call to a home in New Jersey,They found the girl in the basement, shivering and experiencing withdrawal symptoms from a massive ecstasy dose. Doctors later said the girl might not have survived another day. Romney's former partner credits Mitt Romney with saving his daughter’s life, “It was the most amazing thing, and I’ll never forget this to the day I die.”


Don't believe me? I got it from Snopes. The entire article is worth reading.

http://www.snopes.com/politics/romney/search.asp




THAT is a man I want for President.

It's not real so stop

Please everyone stop pinning images like this. THEY ARE NOT REAL.

Well, I guess some of them are real, but I would say they aren't REALISTIC.

It's been driving me crazy for some time now. Because not one of the people who post these--look like this, or at least I haven't noticed one.

So that means everyone out there posts these to remind themselves of what they "should" look like, or at least aspire to.

Let me tell you--at my fittest in college I was tiny. I had a six pack if I flexed--well a 4 pack, for some reason I could never find the bottom two. I remember asking my boxing instructor how to get rid of the little layer of fat I had just below my belly button, and she said--you can't--you are a woman and it is there for a purpose. But I still tried.

I didn't have a body image problem, I ate as much as I wanted, and exercised because I loved to but I still wanted that six pack.

Fast forward to now. I have had four kids. I still have the same frame--haven't gained an inch past my all time high of 5 feet.

With every child I layered on some---dare I say it--- FAT!! *cringe* (Please sense my sarcasm)

Am I fat? No. I am tiny, but I do have a gut that sticks out over my jeans that often prompts people to ask if I am pregnant. I also have got that weird muscle thing that sometimes happens to pregnant women, where their muscles spread apart and don't go back--that contributes to what I lovingly refer to as my "beer gut"

Why am I telling you this? Well, because I know people refer to me as tiny and many people wish that their only problem was a beer gut and slightly thicker thighs. I want everyone to know that I do not look like that picture nor will I ever.

Even at my most fittest since my four kids--I weighed 113 and was working out regularly and eating well--I looked nowhere near this picture. I wish I would have taken a picture of myself just so I could post it. I was strong and healthy. And had I taken that picture, I doubt it would have been pinned as a strong and healthy body.

There were no ab muscles in site, and plenty of cellulite on my thighs and rear. And don't forget those lovely stretch marks.

So my point here is mostly to give up. (wow I'm a motivator!) But seriously--if this is your goal--give up. The only people I've ever seen that look like this post baby--are eating nothing, have a messed up body image, are taking some weird synthetic chemical ("it's not synthetic--it come from a pig"--someone actually told me--um, gross) or they straight up need to sort out their priorities.

Don't expect to look like this--is it possible? Yes probably, but seriously--women are given fat--yes FAT--that word again, so that they can protect and provide for those wonderful babies they are lucky to carry.

So embrace it. Bring back the Marilyn Monroes. Be curvy, be soft, be a woman.

You can be this--and be healthy and strong.

Either way--be REAL--istic.

On failing and winning

I am failing. On so many random things as a parent I am failing.

My children as of late have chosen marker on walls as their aim to break my sanity. MULTIPLE TIMES. Even my Kindergartner has joined in. I've loaded their tongue with Tobasco sauce. So far it's worked for one. The other--I caught writing on their new Kitchen set. The only markers we have are my 9 year olds and I bought her a lock box to keep them in. But they sneak out, and somehow directly into the hands of the three year old.

I am done. I am done not being able to keep anything nice. I want--and need--to buy a new couch but I can't. Because it will end up with marker and piss and greasy wiped fingers. Add in goldfish crumbs, crusts of bread and who knows what else.

I know that someday people say I will miss this. But I don't think so. I may miss messes on the floor, and stumbling upon legos and forts. But I WILL NOT MISS my children ruining things.

Last night, I caught my 5 year old jumping up and down on their little toy cat piano thing that has the microphone. An expensive toy. So I snapped. Straight up snapped. I grabbed her little arm and layed her on her back and put my foot on her and starting poking her with it all over (not painfully--just enough to make my point) and I threatened to stand on her and jump up and down like she did the cat piano. She saw the crazy in my eyes. I told her that if she was going to treat toys like that I was going to treat her like that. I put her in her bed and she snatched her blanket and had the biggest "Oh my crap my mom has lost it and is probably going to kill me" look in her eyes. And I had. Not kill--but possibly doing something absolutely nutsball (oh wait, I just did)

Did I mention that Josie put her knee through a window the other day? Her older sister was outside and taunting her so she tried to "kick it" with her knee. I thought boys broke windows--not tiny little girls. But she did and a GIANT SHARD of glass fell out and landed on Annabelle's foot. It should have straight up sliced it in half, but it just made a deep cut on the top--only a few centimeters wide. Counting that as a blessing. Luckily I didn't have to punish her. She felt HORRIBLE--worse than if I did anything to her. And she learned--don't kick windows. So we are getting a new window---a full new EXPENSIVE window, because our windows sucks SO BAD it wasn't worth just replacing the pane.

The list goes on. My kids are good kids. At least I think so, but seriouslY?? marker on walls EVERYWHERE?

And scriptures? What? Try having your kid mock you while you are explaining how important the scriptures are and how they should listen. BLOOD BOILING. And then you are supposed to have prayer after that?? My kids pray everyday for me to be patient. my kids keep asking to have Family Home Evening--and I just can't do it. We used to have it regularly, but now that Hyrums work has changed, it's just me and the kids. And I will LOSE IT if I attempt it. So I don't. Not recenty anyway.

The only thing that keeps me from going APE DooDOO on them is my one victory this week. Annabelle who is almost 10 was telling me about this boy at school she says is "kind of an enemy", she says they aren't totally enemies, they just insult each other. So I said, "sarcastic?" and she said "kind of but he says mean things to me". But she is telling me this like it's hilarious. And she tells me a story this kid made up about how she became a ghost and he squashed her or something. And she busted up. She could care less. That girl has the confidence that I always hoped my kids would have. She says that he makes up things and tries to insult her or bug her, or say quasi-mean things. I asked if it was joking, and she said--not really. But she was generally amused at the whole thing.

So as my record as a parent recently

8-1